Rajiv for Malaysia

SUBANG JAYA: A major rat eradication exercise will be launched by Universiti Sains Malaysia and the Subang Jaya Municipal Council (MPSJ) at the SS15 business district in December.

It is the first salvo in a long-term attempt to curb the alarming increase of rats in the municipality.

The pilot project will be spearheaded by USM’s school of biological sciences dean, Prof Abu Hassan Ahmad and MPSJ’s health department director Dr Roslan Mohamed Hussin.

Subang Jaya assemblyman Hannah Yeoh funded the first phase of this research, which involves rat baiting, with a RM5,000 pledge.

Abu Hassan said killing many rats in the first wave was one way of tackling rat infestation in any area.

"Our aim is to reduce and wipe out the population with continuous baiting in the affected areas," he said.

“We will start by placing high quantities of bait and continue this with more bait until we can see a reduction in the consumption of the bait by the rats."

The programme will take three months. A quick assessment will be made to identify the “hot spots” based on public complaints and this is where the major concentration of baiting will be done.

Abu Hassan said rats which consumed the bait would be dead within one to two days depending on the toxicity of the product used.

“Once we start baiting, we need the cooperation of everyone, be it MPSJ or the business community, to quickly remove the dead rats," he said.

“We also need to focus on the sanitation of the area. People need to clean up their own premises of food waste and ensure their garbage disposal is done properly."

Abu Hassan said the rat population normally boomed when there was easy access to food sources.

He said it was important for the council to strictly enforce sanitation practices in restaurants and food outlets if it wanted to seriously tackle rat infestation.